I never know where the inspiration for The Doug Out will come from.
Well this month I was inspired while I was out on the town waiting for my date to arrive.
It was early as the club scene goes, around 9:30.
As I sipped my Grey Goose and Cranberry I was witness to no less than six eligible bachelors being cast off by the best barflies the club had to offer.
While observing from a safe distance, I got the feeling I was watching a team of baseball players walking up to the plate to take they're swing for the fences.
Well if the men were a baseball team, Nolan Ryan was on the mound and pitching a no hitter.

These guys were getting shot down in flames and humbly walking away with their dog tails tucked between their legs.
Suddenly I realized these women who were being approached must have a patented response that has been prepared and refined for the guys they have no interest in.
It was at this time that my date arrived and I was anxious to get her opinion of this parade of losers I'd been watching.
That's when I was inspired and decided to get her take on, as well as some feedback of every "single" female I know.
The results of my unofficial survey revealed that men in the clubs inevitably fall into one of four categories.

We'll start with the cobras. These are the guys that try to sliver in and strike quickly.
Most often they will try to induce the young lady onto the dance floor, and if she's not careful she'll find herself separated from the herd and dancing with a guy she would never even notice in her everyday life.
The crew of losers I was observing fit into this category. Perhaps it was too early and the crowd too thin for the cobras to strike with any success.

The next species of predator we'll discuss are the Lounge Lizards. They tend to be a little older and may have a few bucks to their name.
The Lounge Lizards usually stay close to the bar and wait patiently for their prey to arrive. It's at this point when they offer to buy a round of shots for the barflies Du Jour.
This approach rarely works and the round of shots buys them ten minutes of small talk until their prey retreats back to the ladies room, the dance floor, or wherever they need to go to escape the slimy grip of the Lounge Lizard.

The third and most harmless group we'll discuss is the Chicken Hawks.
These are the guys that haven't matured past their sixteenth birthday.
Their lack of maturity is on full display when they show up wearing their white, New Balance sneakers and order a five dollar Coors Light..
Many times the Chicken Hawks fly alone and stand in the corner refusing to put them selves in a vulnerable position by hitting the dance floor.
If the emotionally dwarfed Chicken hawks decide to make a move he is consistently turned down. To quote my friend Mary, "Don't come at me with no jacked up shoes".

That brings me to the last and most dangerous group of predators, The Vultures.
These guys have honed their skills for years and are much more organized than the other species. The vulture doesn't enter the club until at least 12:30 and in true vulture form they circle around looking for an easy meal in the form of the drunk and vulnerable type. The Vultures are more than willing to wait for the cobras and the Lounge Lizards to get the girls drunk. I have to say my research revealed the vultures are the most successful of the predators. Every woman I spoke to admitted to falling prey to the vultures at least once.

Truth be told, I myself may have been a Vulture in the past. Of course that was before I did the research for this column and realized exactly what a Vulture is. The next time I go to the club I will try not to be a predator, and I will not be wearing jacked up shoes.